Chapter 465: The Seal Is the Seal

October 18, 3:00 p.m., the extension phone in the outer office rang. Li Huilan's finger stayed pressed on the page; He Xiufen reached up from under the window, hooked the receiver to her ear and shoulder, and kept rummaging through a drawer with her other hand. Outside in the alley someone dragged a stack of cardboard boxes past, the paper scraping against the concrete.

"Zhengping Firm."

"Director He, Criminal Division here."

"Mhm."

"The appraisal opinion is in."

The drawer slid shut. He Xiufen set down what she was holding and switched the receiver to her other ear.

"When's it being served."

"Tomorrow morning. The main file came back from the appraisal office this morning—still in the envelope, unopened." There was the sound of paper turning on the other end. "One copy for defense counsel."

"What time."

"Around nine-thirty, by special delivery."

"Noted."

After she hung up, she sat without moving. Li Huilan looked up. "It's in?"

"It's in," He Xiufen said. "We'll talk when I've seen the paper."

She sat at her desk, pen tip resting on her notebook, unmoving. She'd been waiting for this—the random draw on the morning of September 27, ten business days, the seven-day National Day holiday wedged in between, when the courthouse doors were locked and the appraisal office's doors were locked too. On the morning of October 2, at the noodle shop, He Xiufen had said, "Nobody can push anything through these days," and she hadn't counted the days after that. Today it arrived on its own.

All afternoon she'd refilled her cup once, straightened the tin box of old business cards on the windowsill, sat back down. She'd gotten nothing done.

"Couldn't you have asked over the phone, just once?"

"It wouldn't count if I said it." He Xiufen pushed the drawer all the way shut. "When the paper gets here, I'll read it to you word by word."

October 19, 9:30 a.m., footsteps came up the stairs. Someone paused halfway up the landing, caught his breath, then climbed on. The door cracked open, and a man in a blue-gray uniform leaned halfway in, a large kraft envelope tucked under his arm, a return receipt and pen in his other hand.

"Zhengping Firm. From the court."

He Xiufen went over, signed, wrote in the date, tore off the receipt copy, and handed it back. The man turned and went downstairs, his heels striking the third step loudly—the same as on September 17.

She slit the envelope open at one end with scissors. The smell of printing ink came first. She pulled out the pages, smoothed them flat, and read from beginning to end without reciting a word. Only on the second pass did she go back to the first page and read aloud.

"Ningchuan Qiushi Judicial Appraisal Office. Judicial Appraisal Opinion."

"Client: Chengdong District People's Court of Jiangzhou City."

"Two appraisal items. First: whether the seal impression reading 'Jiangzhou Qingyuan Testing Center' on the evidence material and the sample seal impressions were stamped by the same seal. Second: whether the 'Cen Shouye' signature on the evidence material was written by Cen Shouye himself."

"Evidence material: one Qingyuan Testing Center re-test report, five pages. One seal impression at the signature block, one signature."

"Samples obtained by the client: first, seal impressions and signatures from contemporaneous testing reports retained by Qingyuan Testing Technology Co., Ltd.; second, the signature on the complaint in the case file of Cen Shouye v. Qingyuan Labor Dispute, Chengbei District People's Court."

He Xiufen paused there. Shen Zhixia knew that complaint—June 17, in the archives room of the Chengbei District Court, where pages of appointment decisions, pay stubs, and attendance sheets had sat in front of the five-page original. The complaint itself had been at the very front, a signature at the bottom of the last page, slow strokes, each one laid down deliberately. Someone had taken it, to compare against the writing on the report.

"Examination process." He Xiufen's eyes moved down the page. "The evidence material and samples were magnified and compared under identical conditions. No differences were observed in character structure, stroke initiation and termination, or writing speed."

"Appraisal opinion. First: the 'Jiangzhou Qingyuan Testing Center' seal impression on the evidence material and the sample seal impressions were stamped by the same seal. Second: the 'Cen Shouye' signature on the evidence material was written by Cen Shouye himself."

"Appraiser's signature. October 18."

He Xiufen laid the paper flat, both hands resting on the desk.

"He signed it," Shen Zhixia said.

"He signed it."

"And the seal?"

"The seal is the seal. The one on file from Qingyuan back then."

Li Huilan set down her pen at the far end of her desk and said nothing. The room went quiet. Someone was coming down the hallway stairs, one step at a time.

"They measured it." He Xiufen turned the appraisal page right side up and pressed her fingertip against the words "no differences observed." "Compared it frame by frame, and came up with: these characters were written by this person's hand. Nobody guessed it."

He Xiufen took off her glasses and pinched the bridge of her nose. "And that's all it answers: the name is his writing, the seal is the seal. Whether the figures on the paper are right, whether the evidence material is in its original state—it doesn't answer a single word of that."

"Answer those two, and everything else can finally be asked."

"Nine years ago the indictment said your father provided a falsified test report." He Xiufen put her glasses back on. "A falsified document has to be fabricated by someone first. This one wasn't fabricated by anyone. It came out of Qingyuan, and the person who signed off on it was Cen Shouye."

She pulled the copy toward her, flipped to the last page, and glanced at the date. Yesterday.

"How much weight this carries in court," He Xiufen said, "I'm not promising you right now."

"I'm not asking."

"You're not asking, and I'm not saying." He Xiufen held the copy up against an empty spot in the defense file and tucked it in. "The original's in the court file. This is for our records."

She opened her notebook, wrote the date at the top of the page, and beneath it one line: The seal is Qingyuan's seal. The writing is Cen Shouye's writing. When she finished, she capped her pen, pressing down harder than usual.

At 10:30, the phone rang again.

"Director He, the date's set. October 26, 9:00 a.m., First Courtroom."

"The 26th, 9:00." He Xiufen tore a scrap of paper from the edge of her desk calendar and jotted it down in pencil.

"The appearance notices for the three witnesses go out in the next few days. The one up on the mountain—the court's sending a car, leaving Baixi Village at six." Paper turned on the other end. "That stretch of road you reported last time is noted on the dispatch form."

"The petitioner's notice?"

"Going out together. Open hearing. Cause of action, time, and location will be posted at the entrance at least three days before trial."

"Noted."

After replacing the receiver, He Xiufen spoke toward the half-open inner door. "The 26th."

A voice from behind the door answered: "Heard it."

"Seven days." He Xiufen set the scrap of paper on the corner of her desk. "Enough time for me to read my defense statement through once."

"Read it to whom."

"To myself. The parts that don't flow when I read them—those are the parts I've written too heavy." She slipped the pencil back into the pen holder. "Page three's still in the tin box. Whether I read it or not, I'll decide that day."

"The Cen family—should I talk to them or will you?"

"I will."

At 11:00, she took her phone and went out, walked down half a flight, and stood under the window at the stair landing to dial. The windowpane was filmed with dust; the daylight filtered through and made her fingers look pale.

The line connected to the sound of plastic sheeting first, then something being set down on a counter.

"Hello."

"It's me."

"Oh." A barcode scanner beeped. "Go ahead."

"That report your father signed—the appraisal's back," she said. "The seal on it is the same one as the seal impression on file at Qingyuan from back then. The signature—the appraisal says he wrote it himself."

No immediate reply. Someone outside the courier hub was calling "package pickup," his voice carrying from down the road, twice.

"Hold on." Cen Hong called back toward that direction, then returned to the line. "I heard you."

"The paper's here with me. A copy. Arrived this morning."

"My mom can't read," Cen Hong said. "I'll read it to her."

"Read slowly. When you're done, watch how she takes it."

"Mhm." A pause. "I'll shut the front door when I read it. She can't stand noise."

"Trial's on the 26th, 9:00," she said. "If you both go, bring ID and register at the courthouse gate."

"Her heart—can she sit through it?"

"She can sit. Bring her medication."

"It's with us." Cen Hong moved something aside. "Where do we sit that day."

"Public gallery, anywhere. Phones on silent once you're inside. No photos."

"Nobody's taking photos." Cen Hong's tone was mild. "I'll tell my mom... we go and sit on the 26th."

"Don't rush there during morning rush hour," she said. "Just past eight is fine—there'll be a line at the gate for ID checks."

"Got it."

On the other end, someone set a stack of things on the counter; plastic straps rustled as they spread. Cen Hong moved the phone away and said "put it there," then came back.

"If my mom asks, what do I say."

"Tell her the signature was written by him, and the seal is Qingyuan's seal."

"Just like that."

"Just like that. She can hear the rest once she's at the courthouse."

"Okay." Cen Hong said, "I'll let you know once we're set."

After hanging up, she stood on the landing for a while. Someone downstairs was chopping something, a cleaver landing on a cutting board, again and again. She put her phone back in her pocket and headed up. At the second-floor door she paused before pushing it open.

He Xiufen slid the desk calendar toward her and pulled the pencil from the pen holder, laying it on top of the calendar.

"Write it down. Don't just keep it in your head."

The calendar lay open to October, the grid squares crowded with writing: ticket delivery, noodles, detention center, a few phone numbers. The square for the 26th was empty—emptier, cleaner than the ones around it. She looked at that square for a moment and thought of the people who would fill it: someone coming down from the mountain at six in the morning, someone waiting in the witness room, an old woman on the defense bench, and those faces in the public gallery.

She picked up the pencil and wrote: Hearing. 9:00. First Courtroom.

When she finished, she put the pencil back in the holder, tip up.

She looked toward the inner office—the door half open, him standing by the desk, one hand braced on its edge, the other holding the receiver, face turned toward the window.

"I won't be there on the 26th," he said. "Push it back a day. The 27th, or the 28th."

The other end said something. He listened.

"That day I have something," he said. A pause. "Something of my own."

"The 27th, ten in the morning. I'll come to you."

He set the receiver down, very gently.

The inner door stayed half open. The words in that calendar square weren't written deep; the pencil's impression pressed into the lines of the paper. Downstairs, lunch preparations began—the range hood kicked on, sputtered, then settled into a steady hum.

She didn't ask.